Tighter military ties bring France, Germany closer

STRASBOURG, France 
A field of white stone crosses marks the graves of French soldiers alongside gray granite crosses bearing German names in this World War II cemetery – testament to a history of tragedy and reconciliation.

A few kilometers (miles) away, barracks will soon house the first postwar deployment of German soldiers in France, beginning a new era of military cooperation.

The symbolic high point of NATO's 60th anniversary summit comes Saturday when Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Barack Obama walk over a Rhine River footbridge linking France and Germany to meet President Nicolas Sarkozy in a show of alliance unity.

Eyes around the world will be on Obama, but for France and Germany, their leaders' handshakes mean more. Each generation of major French and German leaders, from Charles de Gaulle and Konrad Adenauer to Francois Mitterrand and Helmut Kohl, has sought powerful signs that their countries have overcome historic enmity resulting in three great wars that ravaged both nations.

Sarkozy and Merkel have found their own symbol in the latest chapter in the French-German Brigade, a joint mechanized formation launched in 1989 that until now has been stationed only on German soil. Their decision earlier this year to deploy German soldiers from that brigade in France comes at a time when polls show a majority of French people believe Germans are the people they can trust the most.

The decision also coincides with Sarkozy's decision to have France again join NATO's military command, which France, under de Gaulle, left in 1966.

Bernard de Monferrand, France's ambassador to Germany, told a recent colloquium on French-German relations that the arrival of some 600 German soldiers in Illkirch, a suburb of Strasbourg where the NATO summit is being held, "will mean something extraordinary."

French and German officials hope that tighter defense cooperation between the two countries will increase their military and political weight in the alliance and strengthen efforts to build a common European defense.

"We are very satisfied," said Reinhard Schaefers, Germany's ambassador to France.

"I expect that the role of France will grow" within the alliance as a result of Paris' decision to participate fully in alliance military planning, he said. "It opens greater scope for European defense policy."

Sarkozy gains political clout both in Europe and in Washington by plunging into the heart of the alliance's military affairs. But he also wants to ensure that Europe has the military muscle to match its economic prowess. That has become a leitmotif of his presidency.

"Europe cannot be an economic heavyweight if it is not capable of ensuring its defense," the French leader said this week on an early morning live interview on one of France's most popular radio stations.

With the United States seeking greater military contributions from the NATO countries and a greater global role for the alliance, France and Germany are seeking to shore up their ability to shape the agenda themselves, especially in light of persistent public opposition to NATO.

NATO cannot substitute for the United Nations as the framework for world security, German Foreign Minister Franz-Walter Steinmeier wrote in Thursday's edition of "Spiegel Online." "Even less is suited to be a `global policeman' for all possible conflict situations."

Away from the hubbub and pomp of the official military ceremonies, the glamor of appearances by first ladies and the demonstrations by anti-NATO protesters in central Strasbourg, the joint cemetery on a busy highway on the eastern edge of the city was deserted and eerily silent.

But the 5,843 German and French soldiers buried side by side were a powerful reminder of their countries' shared history and their leader's determination to shape their common future.

"In this moment, Berlin needs Paris ..." Pierre Rousselin, international affairs writer for the Le Figaro daily said in a commentary on the NATO and G-20 summits in Thursday's edition of the conservative daily, "and Paris needs Berlin."